


When It Hit Her

by CJ_fics



Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: F/M, Fluff and Angst, angst with happy ending, eventual olicity, olicity - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-25
Updated: 2014-12-25
Packaged: 2018-03-03 10:58:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,771
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2848433
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CJ_fics/pseuds/CJ_fics
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Felicity was on a date with Ray Palmer when she realises what an idiot she has been.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. When It Hit Her

Felicity could kick herself for being stupid. If it were physically possible, she would do it, too. She hated it when she was wrong. For someone with an IQ and knowledge like hers, being wrong was not something that she was used to. More than that, Felicity prided herself by knowing exactly who she was and how she thought and felt about things.  
  
So, she didn’t expect this. And, boy, was she wrong about this.   
  
She was on her fifth date with Ray Palmer when she realised what a mistake she had made.   
  
When Ray asked her out after she rejected his offer to play a part in revamping the new Applied Sciences Division in Queen Consolidated, Felicity didn’t think much about saying ‘Yes’ to his dinner invitation. Why would she think hard on it, anyway? Ray Palmer was a fine specimen — dashing, highly intelligent, highly articulate, charming and very attractive. And he seemed to really like her. And they were both available. And it’s been so long since someone really showed an interest in her.   
  
Well, no, that’s not true. Three months ago, Oliver Queen had shown an interest in pursuing something more with her. To be honest, that decision to say ‘Yes’ to Oliver’s invitation to dinner took more deliberation on her end. _How would it affect the team dynamic if she and Oliver started dating? How would it affect their Arrow work? How would it affect their QC work? Was she ready to take on being Oliver Queen and The Arrow’s significant other? Was this another ruse to entrap another super villain?_   
  
Before Oliver had asked her out to dinner, she had put her relationship with Oliver in the ‘Platonic friends only’ bin in her head. She was telling the truth, to herself and to him, when she said that the though of two of them together was unthinkable.

There was time when the idea of the two of them was something that she entertained. But some time in that flight back from Moscow, after seeing Isabel Rochev exiting Oliver’s hotel room, looking like she had spent a significant amount of time rolling in the sheets with him, Felicity shoved the thought of being something more with Oliver elsewhere in her mind. By the time they landed in Starling City, Oliver was safely ensconced in the ‘Platonic friends only’ bin in her mind.

And it worked. It really did.   
  
When she had asked Oliver again ‘Why Isabel?’, the point she was trying to make, and had made at the end of the conversation, was that Oliver deserved better. He was such a great guy. Heroic. Beautiful. Big-hearted. Generous. A bit grumpy and broody but nobody’s perfect. She just wanted better for him. She wanted him to see that he deserved better than a venomous character like Isabel Rochev. That he should want better for himself. Her disappointment about that issue was only about what sleeping with someone like Isabel implied about how Oliver viewed himself.  
  
So, when he got involved with Sara Lance again, Felicity had accepted it. Sara was leagues better than Isabel Rochev. Sara was a true partner to someone like Oliver Queen and The Arrow, Felicity believed. Whatever moment of self-doubt that Felicity had about Sara was just all about her place in the team. It didn’t help that Oliver and Sara had showed announced their involvement to the team in the same week that the Clock King had beaten Felicity at what she believed to be her expertise, and on something that Felicity was confident she was contributing to the team.   
  
Felicity knew that Diggle thought that she was jealous of Sara. She really wasn’t. She was just used to being the only girl in the team, and she was used to being the one Oliver relied on for all his science-y needs. When Sara proved an expertise in a science-y thing, on top of her fighting prowess, Felicity felt superfluous. That was all.

She was really happy for Oliver — and Sara — for finding someone that they could trust with themselves, their lives, and their secrets.  
  
Felicity could admit that, some days, she felt envious of that. She, too, wanted to find someone that she could share her day with — secrets and all. But she never really allowed herself to think too much on it. Really.  
  
Felicity had allowed herself to be cautiously excited about the idea of sharing something more with Oliver when he asked her out. She vowed to not let that get in the way of their mission and the team dynamic, even when Oliver behaved like such a cute doofus, asking her about her dinner preferences while on a high speed chase. _Who does that?_  
  
When their date ended with an explosion (and not the good kind), and she woke up in the lair’s medical slab, bloody, bruised and burnt, with Oliver hovering over her form looking like he couldn’t live with himself, she knew that that was the end of the idea of them. She swallowed her disappointment and told herself that at least it ended before she could fall in love with Oliver Queen. Because she knew she really could have, and she was grateful that Oliver gave up on the idea before it happened. That was the only way that she could have accepted Oliver’s reasons for not pursuing anything more between the two of them. If she had been head over heels in love with Oliver Queen, she would have fought for them. But she wasn’t. So, she could accept that there were more important things than whatever she and Oliver could be together. Things like their crusade, the team, Oliver’s heroism, and her own heroism.  
  
So, with calm mind and her heart intact, she let the idea go. She was able to promise Oliver that she would not leave him and their mission. That she would still provide him technical support and assistance in both his lives. That they would always be friends.   
  
Phrases from a remembered Symborska poem went in a loop in her head in the weeks and the months that followed. They provided such comfort.  
  
 _"I owe so much to those I don’t love. The relief that I agree that someone else needs them more."_  
  
 _"The peace I feel with them, the freedom — love can never give or take that."_  
  
 _"I understand what love can’t, and forgive as love never would."_  
  
She comforted herself with the thought that while she did love Oliver, it wasn’t the love that that that poem meant. She wasn’t in love with him. And whatever pang she felt left of centre in her chest was just her being disappointed about the loss of whatever potential the two of them had, and her own loneliness.   
  
When Ray Palmer started asking her out, her only hesitation came from not wanting to be disloyal to Oliver. After all, Ray Palmer was the one who was trying to take Queen Consolidated away from Oliver. He was the one who eventually, after months of battling against him, got control over the company. As Oliver’s friend, she would never ever ever take Ray Palmer up on his offers, be they the professional or the personal kind.   
  
It was Oliver who encouraged her to accept Ray Palmer’s offer. He told her that he would never think her disloyal, if she accepted Ray Palmer’s invitation. That Ray Palmer was a good man, someone that someone like her deserved. And that she should not allow anyone or anything to get in the way of something that could lead to her happiness. So, she should give Ray Palmer a chance, and if he fucks it up, then let him know so he could put an arrow in the other man’s knee.  
  
With Oliver’s assurance, she said ‘Yes’ to Ray’s dinner invitation. It was really a No Brainer, that decision.  
  
She hasn’t regretted the decision to start seeing Ray since. He was good to her. He treated her with respect. He was interesting and gorgeous and had a great sense of humour. He could nerd out like the best of them. He made her laugh. And they really liked each other. Their dates always went smoothly and had ended with kisses that she enjoyed. If she made any comparisons to the few kisses she shared with Oliver, she dismissed them with “ _Well, of course, Oliver Queen kisses are memorable. He’s Oliver Queen! He’s had enough time, experience and partners to perfect his technique_.”  
  
Tonight, though, as she gazed at him and listened to him speak passionately about his vision to turn Starling City into Star City (yet another point in Ray Palmer’s favour), her mind wandered.   
  
She was thinking of several things all at once. How Star City sounds like a Hollywood rip off and how when she points that out to Ray, he would sure to get a laugh. About how the guys were doing tonight (she knew there wasn’t a major case tonight, just general patrolling, that’s why she was free to go to dinner with Ray). The blue jumper she saw in the shop on her way to work this morning that would look really cute on Baby Angela, Diggle and Lyla’s little girl, and that she must buy it tomorrow over her lunch break. Her mother’s last phone call where Donna Smoak spent ninety percent of the time gushing over this new love that she just met, and how Felicity should meet him because she would surely love him, too. The new waitress in the newly re-opened Verdant who was so smitten with Roy, and was so obvious about it. Questions around where Thea Queen was, and if Sara and Nyssa had been successful in getting a location on her. Oliver and the look in his eyes when he told her to give Ray Palmer a chance, smiling so supportively. The way he nodded with his jaws clenched when she told him she would accept Ray’s invitation. The same smile and nod the three times she asked for time off away from the lair so she could have dinner with Ray. Supportive. Accepting. Sad.  
  
She stopped her rambling thoughts, _Sad?_ Oliver wasn’t sad. He was happy. He was lighter now. He really was. He smiled a lot more.   
  
Granted, she has been missing what she had dubbed his “Felicity You are Remarkable” smile as of late. He never smiled like that at her.

The last time she saw that was right before the restaurant they were having dinner in exploded. He had been holding her hand as she babbled on and on and on about that one time when she joined a feminist hacker group that targeted porn and misogynistic sites as a way to show him that he wasn’t the only one who had a checkered past. He had told her, voluntarily, she might add, about his time in Hong Kong and what Amanda Waller had him do. He was feeling so bad about his past that she had to alleviate the sad, brooding, guilt-ridden look in his eyes by divulging her first foray into the world of what could be deemed as cyber terrorism. Because she hated it when Oliver got that look. Like he wasn’t someone worth anything. She hated it. Because he couldn’t see how good he was. How amazing he was. How remarkable he was. How much she admired him for what he is, for surviving and regaining his humanity. How much she—  
  
"Felicity?" Ray interrupts her wandering thoughts. With her startled attention back on him, Ray says teasingly, "Am I boring you?"  
  
"Oh, no, no! Sorry, my head is in the clouds," Felicity explained, reaching her hand to clasp his.   
  
"Penny for your thoughts then?" he asks, reaching for his pocket to place a penny on the table. _He is so cheesy_ , Felicity thinks laughingly, charmed.  
  
She plucks a random thought from before her mind was captivated by thoughts of Oliver, and shares it with Ray, “Oh, my mom’s in love again. She called the other day to gush about this guy being The One. She’s sure of it, she says. So much so that she wants me to take a trip back home soon so that I can meet him. She said, I would love him.”  
  
"If you want, we can take one of the Palmer jets to Vegas. Just let me know when," he responds.   
  
"Wow, really?" she exclaims. _He was offering the use of one of his jets to her to go visit her mother? This guy was as close to perfect as possible._  
  
"Yeah, really," he shrugs, "Anytime."  
  
"The last time I was on a private plane — the only time, actually — was when we traveled to Moscow to visit the QC holdings there," she says, not aware that she was making a face.  
  
"What’s with the face?"  
  
"Huh? Oh, it wasn’t as fun as I thought it would be. Because Isabel Rochev crashed the trip. It was supposed to be only Oliver, Diggle and me on that trip but Isabel found out about it and insisted to tag along. As co-CEO of QC," Felicity explains sulkily.   
  
"It was supposed to be a business trip, yes? So how much fun would that be? I mean, Isabel’s presence couldn’t have changed the nature of the trip, right?" Ray asks, smiling.  
  
"No, it was different. Because — because Isabel is cold-hearted, venomous snake,"   
  
"Yeah, I know she was. But at that time, you didn’t know that, no?"  
  
"Uh… no, not really. I didn’t know then that she was plotting with that terrorist, Slade Wilson, to take down the Queen family," she responds. It was common knowledge that Isabel Rochev was in cahoots with the guy who sought to destroy Starling City and ruin the Queen family.  
  
"So, why would you have minded her presence in that trip? For all you knew at that time, she was just really interested in performing her duties as a co-CEO," Ray commented fairly.  
  
Felicity nods, he was right. They had accomplished everything they set out to do on that trip. Isabel’s presence didn’t derail them from achieving their mission to rescue Lyla from the Russian prison where she was being held. Their business there went smoothly.   
  
_But not with an Oliver / Isabel hook-up on the side — that was horrible,_ she thinks. Then mentally bats away the thought. It was none of her concern.  
  
"Anyway, this time, I’ll try to make up for that first and only private plane experience. We’ll have fun," Ray promised, "See the sights. And all of that."  
  
"Oh, I know we will," Felicity said positively. And she was sure of it. A vacation with Ray, she was sure would also be drama-free. He would be the perfect tour guide, the perfect companion. She wouldn’t have to worry about him falling into some deep dark moment. There would be no need for her to comfort him, unlike Oliver.   
  
She imagined how a vacation with Oliver would be like, and nearly laughed out loud. Oh, how she would spend the entire time making sure that he was having fun and a break from his usual broody thoughts. How she would make sure that he got ample time to rest his weary body, recover a bit more of his soul. They would probably lose most of their vacation time talking about deep stuff rather than being tourists…  
  
In her mind a line from that same Szymborska poem played, _"Trips with them always go smoothly, concerts are heard, cathedrals visited, scenery is seen."_  
  
She shook her mind off her thoughts. That poem was for Oliver, not Ray. Not that she was in love with Ray. She really wasn’t. It was not possible. Her heart was taken already. She was—  
  
"Dessert!" she exclaims to jostle her mind from her thoughts.  
  
"You must really be excited about the Creme Bruleé," Ray said, chuckling at her outburst.  
  
She smiles and nods, taking a good look at Ray as he motioned the waiter to their table.   
  
He really was the perfect specimen. He was complex and intelligent and passionate about his hopes and dreams. But never to the point where he would allow himself to be sullen. Felicity corrected herself, Ray had been sullen at times, he had a very tragic past himself. But never in such a way that she felt the need to be his sole source of comfort. She never felt the need to dig deep into her heart to say words that would show how much she believed in him. Ray Palmer, for all his perfection and _perfectness for her_ , never quite required her to draw from her most vulnerable places for him.  
  
No, she never quite felt the need to do that for Ray Palmer.   
  
No, she never quite felt the desire to do that for Ray Palmer.  
  
Unlike with Oliver Queen.   
  
With Oliver Queen, she needed to be a source of comfort, of love. The sole source. She took his pain personally, requiring herself to dig deep into her own pain, her own hurts, and channel them into words of encouragement, comfort and belief. _For him and only him._  
  
"Fuck," she murmurs in shock at what she had just learned about herself. _How could she have been such an idiot? So blind to her own heart?_  
  
"What? Do you want another dessert? I ordered the chocolate mousse, maybe we can share our desserts?" Ray asks, concerned.  
  
"No, no," she says quietly.  
  
"Then what?"  
  
"I’m in love with Oliver Queen."  
  


———

[Quoted poem, _Thank-You Note_ by Wislawa Szymborska]


	2. Tonight, They Win

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Oliver is bruised and battered, but he's still winning.

Oliver was going to call tonight a win.  
  
Yes, there was a large gash on his left flank from one of the Triad goon’s Ka-bar, his right ankle was twisted, and he had bullet graze on the right side of his neck. And his muscles were sore — very sore — from all the punches he took from Triad members as the team successfully stopped an illegal shipment of drugs at the docks, and helped the SCPD to apprehend everyone involved, tonight. But Diggle was able to head home in one piece, a bit bruised but nothing serious. Roy, with one black eye,  was on his way to meet his friend, Sin, for some kind of zombie movie marathon at her place. And Felicity had been safely away from the fighting, directing tonight’s mission from her command centre at the foundry.  
  
So, he was going to put this in the ‘Win’ column.  
  
"You and I have very different definitions of ‘winning’," Felicity says as she tends to his injuries. She had his right foot and ankle in a bucket of ice, and she was working on stitching up his left side. Some parts of the wound were deeper and needed stitches.  
  
He obviously murmured his thoughts aloud. She continues, “For me, winning is all of you coming home in un-harmed. And I mean, no knife wounds that need stitches, no bullet wounds that could have been lethal, if the shooter had better aim and you had less quick reflexes, and no broken ankles. And yeah, stopping the bad guys. Or in this case, bad guys and a bad girl. China White was there, right?”  
  
"My ankle is not broken, Felicity. At most, it’s strained," Oliver offers, trying very hard to not take her words, ‘ _coming home_ ’, too seriously. It was just a turn of phrase. It shouldn’t mean more than that.  
  
He reminded himself that Felicity was not his, was never his, and will never be his. She was on her way to building something permanent with Ray Palmer now — and he was glad for it. Felicity deserved the best in life. She didn’t deserve to be involved with man who was broken and haunted, and who lived a life that would put her life at risk. Had, in fact, put her life at risks multiple times.  
  
He rested his head on his forearms that were folded on the back of the chair, hiding the smile that he knew couldn’t help as he listened to her babble and rant about his injuries and how he should better take care of himself. Her touch, no matter how much her voice got loud, was gentle. Always so gentle. It was one of the things he loved most about Felicity — her touch made him feel safe and cared for. Loved, even.  
  
No, not loved, he told himself, wincing. She loved someone else. Someone who was good for her. Someone perfect. Someone who was a better man than flawed Oliver Queen.  
  
She was never in love with him. Not really.

Yes, Oliver could sometimes catch her drooling cutely whenever he would work out shirtless. If hard pressed, Oliver would admit to doing that deliberately once he first saw her checking him out. Her gaze, while borderline lascivious, didn’t make him feel like a piece of meat on display, which he admitted many women’s eyes on him felt like. More so, after the island. No, there was something innocent in the way she looked at him, something open and honest. It made him feel wanted, and it made him feel want and desire.  
  
But that was just a crush and a healthy appreciation of a well-toned and muscled male body, Oliver believes. It didn’t mean that she was in love with him. It didn’t mean that she longed for him the way he did her.  
  
And anyway, those looks from her had stopped. Ever since that night when he told her that there was no future for them because of his life and his crusade, and she accepted.  
  
The fact that she took that in stride, only behaving awkwardly towards him a few days after and then quickly going back to her old supportive, lovely self, was proof that she wasn’t in love with him. She loved him, yes, he knew that. As a friend. As a teammate. As someone she believed in with all her heart. As a partner in their common goal to save Starling City from everyone who sought to harm it. But she was not in love with him.  
  
And, if Oliver was to be honest with himself, it hurt. Because he was in love with her. Permanently. Unconditionally. Indelibly.  
  
He sighed, having her hands on him was equally heaven and hell. Especially since he had missed her touch these past three weeks.  
  
"I’ll be done soon," she murmured, misunderstanding his heavy sigh.  
  
"Take your time," he said, lifting his head towards her to flash her a smile before putting his face back on his forearms. Knowing that this time between them, when she had her hands on him, making him feel safe, was finite, he was going to savour it. He closed his eyes to better commit the feeling to his memory. _Who knew when he was going to get this opportunity again?_  
  
It’s been a while since Felicity had touched him. In the days after their agreement to cancel whatever it was that was brewing between, there was a few days where Felicity was self-conscious about skin contact with him. But after a couple of weeks, her casual touches — a hand on his arm, a hug after a dangerous mission, her hand on top of his as she explained something to him — returned. Yet another proof that she wasn’t gutted by their mutual decision to end any chance of them. But he welcomed it. Even when she began dating Palmer over a month ago, she was as at ease with Oliver as she had ever been.  
  
He supposed it helped sell the idea that he was as all right with their decision as she was when he encouraged her to agree to Palmer’s invitation to dinner. Loyal, steadfast, sweet, noble, honourable, principled, remarkable Felicity wouldn’t allow herself to take chance on Palmer because she thought that it was a betrayal of her friendship with Oliver. While he fell deeper in love and in admiration for her for it, he tortured himself with the thought that he was such a dick, who didn’t afford Felicity with the same loyalty when he jumped into bed with Isabel Rochev. A woman who was cruel to her. A woman who thought nothing more of Felicity than some trashy whore who slept her way to the top. He didn’t even bother to defend Felicity from Isabel, simply claiming that they were just friends.  
  
It was that thought, that a man like him was lucky enough that Felicity deemed him worthy to be her friend even though he was so far off from deserving someone like her, that motivated him to speak words of encouragement about her and Palmer. He swallowed every territorial, selfish instinct to place Felicity as far away from a real competitor, and told her to give herself a chance to be happy with Palmer.

It was then that he acknowledged that he had and would never love anyone else like he loved Felicity Smoak. This kind of love, where her happiness, with or without him, was more important than his selfish needs and desires, was new to him.  
  
He’d never felt that way about anyone before. He suspects, he never will. He doesn’t want to. He resigned himself to spending the rest of his life, settling for second best — one where Felicity was still part of his life, but never his.  
  
He could live with that.  
  
Until she stopped touching him. Things with Palmer were probably getting serious, he believed. But now, every time he saw her, he had to stop himself from throwing the mother of all tantrums to demand that her not touching him, her not laying a comforting hand on his shoulder, her not hugging him in relief was not part of the deal that he made with himself in his head. Because a Felicity-hug-free life was unbearable. Only the thought of how that would affect her happiness, stopped him from acting like a bastard.  
  
"All done here," Felicity says, gently patting the bandage on his flank before moving to inspect the wound on his neck, "Oliver, you have to raise your head a bit so I could see what I need to do with this one."  
  
Oliver breathes in deep, trying to inhale her breath on the back of his neck, before lifting his head. Felicity moves more fully to his right side to attend to the bullet graze. It doesn’t take her long to cleanse the wound, and apply antiseptic gel and a bandage on it. Once she’s done, she pecks a kiss on the bandage over the wound.  
  
The action startles the both of them, she moves so quickly away from him that for a few seconds, he thought he had imagined it.  
  
"Uh … Heheh. Sorry," Felicity stutters, "I didn’t mean to do that."  
  
Oliver stands up slowly from the chair and removes his right foot from the right bucket to hobble to where she was beginning to re-organise their med kit.  
  
"It’s all right, Felicity. I liked it," he says gently.  
  
Felicity blushes and gives him a small smile, not meeting his eyes, and continue to pack away their medical supplies.  
  
"You should head home, Felicity. I’ll just get a shirt and then I’ll walk to your car," Oliver offers after helping her with her task.  
  
"You’re not walking anywhere on that ankle, Oliver," Felicity retorts.  
  
"You’re not heading to the parking lot by yourself, Felicity," Oliver growls.  
  
"I have a tazer, care of Diggle, and a can of pepper spray, care of Roy, and small knife, care of you, in my bag," she insists, "You need to stay off your ankle. In fact, I should prepare an ice pack for you before I go."  
  
"You’re not going to your car by yourself, Felicity. We’re in the Glades, remember? And things can go wrong!" he says, hobbling to where he left his t-shirt.  
  
"Ugh! Fine, I’ll stay with you then," Felicity concedes, then realises what she said, "I mean, stay here tonight at the lair. You just happen to be here. I don’t mean stay here tonight with you with you."  
  
"I know what you mean, Felicity," Oliver says sadly. It was tempting idea to spend more time with Felicity — he always wanted to be in Felicity’s orbit — but it won’t be right. The foundry, even with the pull-out couch and the cot, won’t be a comfortable place for Felicity to sleep in. "You should go home and sleep in your bed, Felicity. My ankle will be fine."  
  
"And how do you think you can go up and down the stairs on that ankle?" Felicity puts her hands on her hips.  
  
"Very slowly," he smirks.  
  
"You know, I could run up the stairs and be out in the parking lot and in my car before you can even reach the foot of the stairs," she says, looking like she was considering the idea.  
  
"But you won’t,"  
  
"What makes you so sure? You know I can run in taller heels than what I’ve got on," she challenges.  
  
"Of course, you can. I have no doubt about that," he responds, smiling at her.  
  
"So, what makes you so sure that I won’t run and leave you in my dust?"  
  
"Because you love me," Oliver blurts out. His eyes widen as he realises what he just said. He clears his throat, looking away from her, "I mean, like a friend! A teammate. A friend! I don’t mean love me, _love me_. I know that. I mean, you won’t run from me because you know I will follow and further injure my ankle. Maybe even pull out my stitches. And you wouldn’t want that. Because you care about me. Not care about me, _care about me_. I already told you I know that— Can you stop me from speaking? Now? Please—”  
  
"Three," Felicity steps closer to him.  
  
"Two," she takes another step.  
  
"One," she’s within hugging distance. There’s a smile and blush on her face when Oliver finally dares to look at her  
  
"I love you, _love you_ , Oliver Queen,” she says.  
  
"Yeah?" he asks nervously. The butterflies in his stomach that have taken up residence ever since he realised how much he loved Felicity, and whenever she was near, going crazy.  
  
In response, Felicity wraps her arms around his neck and goes on her tippy-toes and kisses him. He kisses her back. Of course, he kisses her back! He wraps her arms around her waist to pull her closer as he deepens the kiss, his tongue and hers coming out to play.  
  
They’ve kissed before when he was hopeful that they could have everything together, and when she believed the idea of them to be possible. This kiss was as thrilling, and, for lack of a better word, scorching, as any of the kisses they’ve shared before. As _meaningful_. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he knows every kiss that they would share will feel like this — and that it would never grow old for him.  
  
He doesn’t know how long they kiss, and how many kisses there were. They all just blended together in a timeless, stomach-swooping, lusty dance. Eventually though, his injuries, his sprained ankle, specifically makes itself known. He winces as he pulls back but doesn’t release her.  
  
Felicity looks up at him, lips swollen and smiling, eyes half-mast and dazed — _just so, so sexy_ , he thinks — until she sees his wince, “Are you in pain? It’s your ankle, isn’t it.”  
  
She pulls away from him to lead him to the pull out couch. As she helps him find a comfortable spot, reality intrudes into Oliver’s happy bubble.  
  
"What about Palmer?  
  
"I stopped seeing Ray weeks ago," she answers, refusing to meet his eyes. It seems reality had intruded into her thoughts as well.  
  
"Why? Did he do something to upset you? Do I need to pay him a visit? I will—"  
  
"Why did you encourage me to date Ray?" she asks instead.  
  
Not able to stand her not meeting his eyes, he tugs her to sit next to him and lifts her chin with his fingers, “Because he’s perfect.”  
  
"I know," Felicity says, then adds, "But I don’t love him. I don’t think I ever could. Not the way I love you."  
  
"Felicity—"  
  
"I know why you pushed me towards him, Oliver. I know why you gave up on the idea of you and me," she interrupts, "And I allowed it because I thought that I wasn’t in love with you. I told myself that, at least, we ended before I could fall helplessly in love with you. So it was OK. I could let you go because there were more important things to focus on. I told myself that whatever hurt I felt was just disappointment about quitting the idea of us. But I was wrong. I am in love with you, I just didn’t realise it until a few weeks ago. I was such an idiot."  
  
"Hey, you’re not," Oliver says, not allowing her to put herself down in any way.  
  
"I am! Here I am declaring my love for you when I don’t even know how you feel about me! I tried to distance myself from you, Oliver, after I realised because I didn’t know how you felt about me. I—"  
  
"I love you, _love you_ , too, Felicity,” he declares, offering her a shy smile.  
  
"Really?"  
  
"Really," he affirms, "But the reasons why we can’t be together still stand, Felicity. I don’t want to endanger you. The life that I lead—"  
  
"The life that _we_ lead, you mean?” Felicity says, “I’m a part of your life, Oliver. I refuse not to be. I won’t be in any more danger, if we’re together or not!”  
  
"But—"  
  
"No, buts! Whatever arguments you have against the idea of us will, from now on, be ignored," she announces, pecking him swiftly on the lips. She smiles smugly at him — he’s never seen such a sexy smile in his life — and adds, "Now that I know that I love you, _love you_ , and that you love me, _love me_ back, I’m going to ignore those reasons. Just watch me.”  
  
He closes his eyes in happiness, sighing with a smile. He opens his eyes, smile still in place, “Yeah?”  
  
"Yep!"she exclaims, her smile, blinding.  
  
Giving into her, to the happiness he knows that he can only find with his Felicity, to the hope that he would prove to be the man that Felicity Smoak deserves, Oliver pulls Felicity deeper into his arms and kisses her.  
  
As the kiss turns into something more, Oliver thinks, _Yep, tonight is definitely a win._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is also a prompt fic.
> 
> Original post: http://outoftheclosetshipper.tumblr.com/post/96979365038/tonight-they-win

**Author's Note:**

> Original post: http://outoftheclosetshipper.tumblr.com/post/96957885558/when-it-hit-her


End file.
